Pooh-Bah's Titles
By giving Pooh-Bah all the titles he does, Gilbert suggests that he's just a supernumerary, an attendant who has no real purpose in the world. Most of the titles are real and refer to members of the royal household, which humorously inflates Ko-Ko's importance and deflates, gently, it must be admitted, the importance of the actual people who held the titles.
Martyn Green developed a kind of backstory for Pooh-Bah, in which he must have done something, probably accepted a bride, which explains his "possible fall from grace and high officialdom" (Green 417 n. 21). Green also points out a connection, which he compares to plagiarism, between Pooh-Bah's many titles and some lines from Planche's 1840 The Sleeping Beauty:
There is little doubt that Gilbert was, at times, something of a plagiarist. The ... scene [in Act I, in which Ko-Ko interviews Pooh-Bah in several of his roles about how to pay for his upcoming nuptial celebration until he can find one whose decisions he likes], or at least the idea thereof, could hardly have come from any other place than The Sleeping Beauty ... in which the Lord Factotum (Lord High Everything Else?) says:
As Lord High Chamberlain, I slumber never;
As Lord High Steward, in a stew for ever;
As Lord High Treasurere, I've the deuce to pay;
(Green 417 n. 20)
and so on. I agree with Green that this characteristic of Pooh-Bah's may have come from Planche, though there was some comment in Gilbert's day about the many roles petty bureaurocrats were able to take. I suspect such a specific reference was as lost on most of Gilbert's audience as it is on us, and the success of the character outside the boundaries of this operetta suggests to me that Gilbert (like Planche) had put his finger on something that struck people as vital and relevant.
Grooms of the Royal household would be aristocrats rather than servants (as we understand the term) and the post offered as a reward or prize.
Master of the Rolls
According to the first edition of the OED, the Master of the Rolls is "one of the four ex-officio judges of the Court of Appeal and a member of the Judicial Committee, who has charge of the rolls [public records], patents, and grants that pass the great seal, and of all records of the Court of Chancery."
The Master of the Rolls at the time The Mikado was written was Sir William Brett, who had the position between 1883-1897, a long tenure (Cook and Keith 155). [Sir William Brett was made Lord Esher in 1885? or Lord Esher had the position in 1885?]. Sir Nathaniel Lindley -- Lord Lindley, 1900 -- was Master of the Rolls between 1897-1900.
Master of the Buckhounds
The relevant meaning of "master" here is the eighteenth: "In many designations of officials having duties of the nature of control, superintendence, or safe-keeping." We use this word in this sense when we say "Master of Ceremonies." The Master of the Horse when this volume of the OED was written was "the officer who has the management of the horses belonging to a sovereign or other exalted personnage." The Master of the Buckhounds, among "the official custodian[s] of certain animals kept for sport or pleasure," had a rank in the ministry and was "the fourth great officer of the household" (18 a-e).
The Master of the Buckhounds headed the royal procession down the race course at Ascot every year. Anyone who got a ticket to the royal enclosure got it from the Master of the Buckhounds ("London Season" 831).
Groom of the Backstairs
The relevant sense of "groom" is the fourth: "The specific designation of several officers of the English Royal Household, chiefly members of the Lord Chamberlain's department." The grooms the OED lists as examples include Groom of the Chamber, Groom of the Privy Chamber, Groom of the Great Chamber, Groom of the Stole, Groom of the Beds, Groom of the Crossbows, Groom in waiting. I think "Groom of the Backstairs" is not a real title but a joke at the expense of other titles given for political favors. The back stairs would be associated with servants in Victorian minds, and not an honor.
First Lord of the Treasury
Sense 11 of the word "treasury" lists Lord of the Treasury and says a treasury is "the individual members (whether peers or not) of a Board appointed to perform the duties of some high office of state that has been put in commission."
Solicitor
In England now and in the nineteenth century, a solicitor is distinguished from attorney. Solicitors can try cases in court.
Lord Chamberlain
Attorney-General
Chancellor of the Exchequer
A chancellor is the "official secretary" of a sovereign. A Chancellor in England might be called Lord Chancellor or Lord High Chancellor. The Lord High Chancellor is "the officer .. who has in course of time become the highest officer of the crown, and an important member of the cabinet" (OED "chancellor" 2a). The title belongs to the "highest judicial functionary in the kingdom, [who] ranks above all peers spiritual and temporal, except only princes of the blood, and the archbishop of Canterbury; he is keeper of the Great Seal, is styled 'Keeper of his Majesty's conscience', and is president and prolocutor of the House of Lords."
The Lord Chancellor in England between between 1880 and 1885 was Lord Selborne, and the man who served as Lord Chancellor between 1885 and 1886 was Lord Halsbury.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer is "the highest finance minister of the British government." The first Chancellor of the Exchequer was appointed under Henry III (OED "exchequer").
Privy Purse
Lord Chief Justice
Leader of the Opposition
In England, the "opposition" is the political party that does not have control of the Parliament, the party in opposition to the Prime Minister.
Paymaster-General
Lord High Auditor
Archbishop of Titipu
First Commissioner of Police
Private Secretary
Groom of the Second Floor Front --
Lord Mayor
Judge Ordinary
This discussion is based on the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, which requires a little explanation.
To Act I or Act II of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado.
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Suggestions, contributions, criticisms, questions? Email Sharon Cogdill.
(c) Copyright 1998 Sharon Cogdill, dramaturg for this production and author of this website.
College of Fine Arts and Humanities
St. Cloud State University
This URL: http://web.stcloudstate.edu/scogdill/mikado/pbtitles.html.
Last update: 11 May 1998.